Polica, Marijuana Deathsquads

[MIDWEST WEIRD] Recall your first spin of Relayted, the 2011 album from Midwest mega-group Gayngs, and tell yourself with a straight face you weren’t hoping for Bon Iver-does-Sade. Rather than being “the next Justin Vernon thing,” the ’80s adult-contemporary pastiche turned out to be visions of the future as portended by Ryan Olson, chief and sonic visionary of Minneapolis label Totally Gross National Product. Upon this flotilla Olson has dispatched from the heartland, we have Polica, an icy, almost trip-hop imagining of the course Gayngs charted, and Marijuana Deathsquads, a dual-drummer barrage of warped vocals, pitch-bent synth pulses and deranged squawking care of Olson and rapper P.O.S. It’s berserk electro for leftover Mars Volta enthusiasts and sensual, electronic dream-pop for everyone else—sounds like a weird second date to me.